On Thu, Apr 1, 2010 at 2:28 PM, Wojtek S <wsoko52 at gmail.com> wrote:
> [WS:] It is nasty out there for ordinary grunts, no doubt. The point I was
> trying to make was a bit different, though - far from being on its knees,
> capitalism got merely a black eye, a hiccup or temporary indigestion if you
> will, but otherwise it is business as usual. No change in sight.
>
> Wojtek
>
>
>
>
> On Thu, Apr 1, 2010 at 2:04 PM, Dennis Claxton <ddclaxton at earthlink.net>wrote:
>
>> At 10:55 AM 4/1/2010, Wojtek S wrote:
>>
>>
>> http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/business/8599343.stm
>>>
>>> [WS:] So the 2008 recession turned out to be a storm in a teacup, after
>>> all.
>>>
>>
>>
>> There's a link to another story on that page though:
>>
>> http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/business/8499693.stm
>>
>> US jobless numbers hide scale of problem
>>
>> By John Mervin
>> Business reporter, BBC News, New York
>>
>> The headline number only reveals a small part of the problem.
>>
>> An official US unemployment rate that hit 10% last year, and seems set to
>> stay there or thereabouts for months yet, already makes grim reading.
>>
>> Yet there's growing concern that even that large and unpleasant number
>> doesn't do justice to the size and severity of America's problem with jobs,
>> or the lack thereof.
>>
>> Dig beneath the headline figure on each monthly jobs report and there are
>> now plenty of other horrors to be found.
>>
>> Take the problem of long-term unemployment. In the eyes of the Bureau of
>> Labor Statistics, which does the counting, the long-term unemployed are
>> people who have been unemployed for more than six months.
>>
>> They now make up roughly 40% of all unemployed. That's more than six
>> million people who have been out work since last summer at least.
>>
>> Real deprivation
>>
>> As America's politicians and media have tried to grasp the full extent of
>> the country's economic problems, they have inevitably looked for comparisons
>> with previous periods of recession and slow growth.
>>
>> So a common comparison these days is the recession of 1982-83 - that's the
>> last time America grappled with 10% unemployment.
>>
>> Which means it's chilling to note that it now takes twice as long (more
>> than 20 weeks) as it did in 1982-83 for an unemployed person to find their
>> next job.
>>
>> Unemployment is always nasty. But it's even worse when it's accompanied not
>> just by stress and anxiety but by real deprivation.
>>
>> That is the experience of increasing numbers of Americans as unemployment
>> benefits run out before the next job can be found.
>>
>> Yet even this doesn't do justice to the sheer scale of America's problem.
>>
>> [...]
>>
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